Thursday 24 June 2010

Evile Infecting Nations 2010 tour. Munich.

Shit needs to get done! I am wanting today to be up and out of the way, Munich it is and Munich is not somewhere I want to be hanging around. Got some ghosts here right. Need to get this shit done, and get the fuck out of here. Also, it’s fucking freezing. Like so fucking freezing. I blog the shit out of that morning, feel a fine sense of achievement right there. It’s too fucking cold to type after a while and so I go for a wander round the venue. Kevill and Arie are in there trying to get net connection and failing so I don’t even bother in fear of getting too angry too early in the day and breaking shit, like my laptop. Back in the bus front lounge, I continue writing until the dressing rooms are opened and haul all my shit in. Breakfast / lunch, brunch is served and we got scrambled eggs and teeny tiny sausages. They went quick, followed by croissants, jam, chips with dips, oh man it was amazing. Absolutely amazing. I set up my merch stand with the help of some random employee who is either security or crew? Yet again, I had run out of gaffa tape, the single most important tool to my trade other than the stock!

Wait, I missed this joyful moment! Our bus is parked right round the fucking corner, so in the pissing snow and ice, we have to trudge through it getting all the equipment in to the venue. Bad mother fucking times right there. Thanks Bastard club.

Merch stand set up out of the way, I finally get a stock check done on the merch I have with me, in lieu of doing the stuff in the trailer next. No such luck ‘cause once again it is dark and snowing. Head office loves me right now I bet. I get some facebook shit done, upload some shit, do more boring shit, ooh and catch up on how the Terrorizer night at The Hobgoblin went. Fucking brilliantly it sounds! Sweet!

Lyall covers the stall for the first 15 minutes while I finish getting ready, no dinner again, and then off I scramble to the venue across the courtyard. There is a massive fucking queue! Not for us, bloody 69 Eyes are playing in the big room aren’t they! Lyall is hating on everything when I get to the stand. Too much to do, and too little time. Off he races to crack on, leaving me to observe the chaos of the stand that he has left behind. And I realise that I have lost a sodding glove, dammit.

Once again it is bought to my attention what a great scene the Thrash scene or indeed any metal scene is for woman to hang out in. There are like so many more men than women in this scene, the ratio is definitely in our favour. Tonight is a shining example yet again, there’s like half a dozen women.

I put out my new flyers, which is totally embarrassing but I think still a good idea. They are little, shitty, punk style leaflets. I quite like them. Someone does take one, which makes me mega excited and blush.

So everyone is getting a bit tetchy now, we must be about halfway through the tour and it’s starting to show in each of us a little, that we have no personal space ever, the closest to that being your bunks or when they are on stage and I’m on my stand. Tonight I am losing my patience with the interference from the band members at the merch stand big time. Thank god we have a day off in a couple of days, it’ll be nice to not be on a strict and tight deadline for a night. To chill for a minute. At this point, I am over having to set up the merch every night and stand there watching them play every night. Which I know is just needing a day off because I love watching all three bands play.

His girl comes up to me, one of the only ones in there and says that She knows me from London. The Crobar to be exact. Through a mutual friend, Jerry. I can kinda recognise her, and when we chat for longer I recall who she is, Isa, and am over the moon to have a girl to hang with tonight! She buys me a beer and goes off to watch Warbringer, a favourite band of hers.

As soon as the Fading start up, there is someone furiously banging their head at the front of the stage, I don’t think we need to worry about a repeat of last nights shit crowd participation. The stage is ludicrously tiny, a little bitty triangle, so a normal very active Ilia who finds it hard to stick in one place, is pretty much having to. I reckon at times like these there is only one thing for it; the singers should join the crowd on the floor, hardcore stylee. I used to work at the 12 Bar in Soho, had a tiny fucking stage, so that’s what the bands would do, half of them would just get on the floor with the crowd. It always looked awesome and the punters fucking love it! My God, I do love a bit of synchronised head banging and The Fading are on it! Nic from Warbringer is sitting up on the closed off balcony, warming up. He catches Shaked’s eye, points his drumstick at him and smiles. Shaked is smiling back from behind his kit. One big, happy, fucked up family. I realise at that moment that Shaked is wearing a Warbringer t-shirt, which makes me crack up laughing right there and then. So many of the guys are wearing each other’s bands merch now, free, clean clothes eh! I have to total it up soon and give them a heads up to watch it a bit, they are fine for now though fuck it!

The head banging has spread throughout the crowd and when they finish, they come cover me on the stand so that I can grab some chow and smoke quickly. I get back two Warbringer songs in and already there is a mosh pit! And we have a circle pit. Not only do we have that, but also some dude clambers up on stage and taps Andy the bassist to move out of his way so that he can stage dive! Ha, too funny. The audience, well about 8 of them carry him impressively and everyone is shouting ‘combat shark’, all good things considering that the venue isn’t packed.
20 Seconds in to Evile’s first song, Infected Nations and we have yet another mosh pit! These lot fucking love the Thrash, it’s awesome.

I have got most of The Fading and a Warbringer on my stall and it is driving me up the wall. Not so much them being there, not only is their company excellent, it is important for bands to meet and greet the punters to help with greater merch sales. What I do not want is this, standing actually behind the stand, so people are crowding over the table to talk to you and I cannot see the stock because you are in my way. Telling me that the person who you are talking with wants such and such, when I am quite clearly serving someone. Standing on the stand doing one or both of the above things when the other bands have just finished is also rude in my books. Bad band etiquette was all over the merch stand in Munich. Oh, and don’t fucking tell me how to display your stuff. If you don’t like how I do it, you can do it yourself. I wouldn’t dream of coming up to you on stage during one of your solos or something and telling you how to roll. Fucking tested my patience that night. I speak to Lyall about it and ask him to have a word to the guys about this, he has noticed it too and it is mucho better coming from him.

I go outside to have a couple of back to back smokes and calm down when I spot the same security / crew guy who gave me a roll of gaffa tape earlier. A massive poster of Method Man has caught my eye, and he says that sure I can have one, and that he will bring one over for me to the merch stand! Sweet! So far our bus has pics of Pammy, Hasslehoff and Slayer up. I think this will be a fine inclusion.

Killer from the deep means mosh time and I feel again, how lucky I am to get to watch these guys play every day. They really are fucking good. The Fading get back from showering, and the stand is covered in a lovely just washed smell that I look forward to getting myself at some stage. I’m just so fucked off with tonight, I can’t snap out my bad mood that the people around me have put me in. Watching Joel play takes my mind off it for a bit. On the last song, his hand is moving so fucking fast it is literally a blur. The kids in front of him look like their eyes are about to pop out of their skulls in disbelief! Nic comes over and pisses about with me; he is fucking great at making me laugh the silly beggar. Then this kid gets up on stage, dives off, but his mates don’t catch him so he goes crashing to the floor. Even Evile stutter a laugh and wince at it. These kids certainly have some big ol’ Thrash souls in them! I torch flash Lyall who is across the room so that I can point out Isa, standing in front of me. She is well his cup of tea, come to think of it; any girl is well Lyall’s cup of tea. Isa has eyes for Kevill from Warbringer though so ah well.

After the gig, Isa stays behind and keeps me company while I pack up, then we get the fuck out of there and go hang backstage in the production office with Lyall. A bottle of Jager is out and opened by the time I finish working out the figures for each band, and with an hour we have downed the lot, with the help of Ol and Laux and Kevill. I chain smoke horrendously ‘cause I know bus call is on it’s way and we fuck about till bus driver Steve comes and gets us to go having eaten and shit.

Up to the front of the bus to continue drinking, it seems our group of badness is now Lyall, Laux, Adam, Ol and me! Sweet! We drink and talk loudly and obnoxiously till who knows what time and fall in to our respective bunks in blurry drunk hazes yet again. When will we learn, I think my money is on not in this lifetime!

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